Part 111
Sitemap --- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- - Lots More fabulous items/ideas for a Bioshock Rapture MMORPG --- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- --- - Part 111 --- --- --- --- --- Jack the ADAM Junkie : ' First how could you tell what state Jack is really in ? You don't see him to see if there are any changes. You don't see Jack directly in the original game, so any minor face/body 'tumors' aren't evident. His hands being the part you usually see, and then they are warped by the Plasmids he is using anyway (hands get mutated by ADAM Plasmids). Crazy part of being a Splicer ? He walks around slaughtering people wholesale, that sounds alot like typical Splicer behavior to me. Jack isn't really there in Rapture for very long (unless you really like continuing conversations with lots of homicidal Splicers, and stop alot to hobnob while enjoying each spots ambiance) so the genetic damage might not be showing yet. Repeated ADAM use is mentioned before sideeffects are noticed, else most people would never have used it if the tumors and such manifested themselves that quickly). We (Jack) keep pumping ourselves full of more ADAM over a time period that is mere days (or hours). The game's excuse of why Ryan simply didn't ban ADAM (and throw Fontaine in prison for intentionally poisoning people) was supposedly that it took so long to manifest itself (You would think that at least a FEW early heavy users getting diseased/mangled/insane would have made the newspapers, and scared the hell out of most Citizens from even touching the stuff, and actually MAKE Ryan regulate the stuff as a public health/safety measure). Somewhere it says that you start to mutate when you don't keep taking ADAM (it is more likely your original genetics try to reassert themselves and so conflict with the partial RNA still activated by the remaining ADAM). Later Plasmids/Tonics may have been improved under Ryan's research - it is not like Ryan would want MORE crazy deformed people in Rapture, when his intentions were rebuilding his city. Fontaine's "army" monster sauce (aggressively mutatious 'Combat' plasmids, probably made with shortcuts and missing stabilizing components) would have eventually run out as Atlas didn't have as much resources anymore to produce them. Canon-fodder against Ryan's greater resources and better organization. How well do you learn to use a combat Plasmid when you can't waste it on training, and you don't last long enough to gain experience ? Jack is also not a normal human, he was bio-engineered (with Lot 111, etc..) by Dr. Suchong. This might allow resistance to mutation and insanity, etc... from using ADAM. Atlas would not have wanted his assassin (Jack) turning into a crazed Splicer before Jack got to Ryan. Again, how long it takes to become freakish looking and/or insane ? We aren't really told (indirectly you can infer it doesn't happen too fast) and there no doubt are variations of reaction depending on how much ADAM used, which ones, Tonics vs Plasmids, how frequently, what is mixed, and some people likely being more/less susceptible, etc... --- --- '''For The MMORPG the Lighthouse is being Torn Down : ' They (New Rapturites) still fear the Surface World (with good reason), so the risk is too much. The remaining connections to the Surface don't justify it continuing. Strange that it hadn't been done already, but if Ryan was planning it, his 'death' sort of got in the way. It might be a 'symbol', but Ryan obviously was trying to keep Rapture secret (so many of his actions emphasized that), that it WOULD have been logical. SO the MMORPG would have a ongoing project (taking quite a while as it largely has to be done by hand, and various equipment has to be salvaged, and certain of the Lighthouse's functions preserved (it has transmitters, air siphons, the Bathysphere Station, the freight transfer dock (Which STILL are used to get emergency shipments from Ryan's surviving Surface Industrial Organization). There might be a game 'trick', to show progress to the Player in this project, that alternate perceptions to each Player show a different state depending on how long they have been playing. Their Client program just displays a different set of Assets than what other Players around them shows. --- --- '''That Other Theater : " 'Bedtime Surprise' was a play written by Sander Cohen, that was shown in the Footlight Theater and Fleet Hall. Possibly, it was one of the propaganda plays promoting Rapture's rising." The Footlight Theater was quite small, and perhaps strained the artistic abilities by its severe limitations (forcing alternate artistic presentation content and emphasis). Perhaps experimental audio visual stage effects were possible (note Cohen's Andy Warhol type delving into film 'art' ...). Perhaps things like audience participation were frequently employed. With it being a Sander Cohen production, perhaps the bizaare and unusual aspects became the reason to go see his Plays in this venue (which itself looks more appropriate to a Burlesque theater). In Rapture, after all, it was more than the Air which had to be recycled ... --- --- Rapture Security Machines (How Early ?) : Lets assume Non-BaSx, because with that DLCs RetCon they went off into weirdsville with so many things, including having various the Security stuff in place that early (near/pre-Kashmir). So the DLC Player had them as opponents - perhaps logical to have them guarding a prison ON THE PERIMETER, but having them strangely inside the interior (hacked by the inmates already) is pretty lamely contrived, when they have so many other logical prison conventions ignored/missing (the hacking skill likewise would need to be developed and passed around, which there might not have been so much opportunity for yet). Early Security devices would probably be more non-fatal at that point on the Timeline - imperfect machines killing/maiming people by accident isn't in the "Philosophy"(machines issuing automatic death sentence wouldn't be allowed). McClendon Robotics (in the Minerva's Den DLC) gives hints that there was some privately bought security (Flybots with guns and the diarist commenting that rockets might be a bit overkill). But having them patrolling public places in Rapture where they might disturb the Citizens even more than the Big Daddies would (who themselves we aren't sure walked around that much at that early a date - later during 'Martial Law', having robots firing rockets at rampant Splicers wouldn't then be so much an issue...). Rapture didn't require that kind of security at so early a point - the New Year's big party atmosphere uplook was "Peace/Security/Safety being restored to the City", post-Fontaine(now dead)... everything getting back to normal. Mindless Bots with machineguns ready to malfunction/mistarget and gun down innocent crowds is far-worse/more-threatening/less-acceptable than bulked up human security forces (and THAT is not evident then either). Consider Fontaine creating Jack in 1956 - it being much much further into the past, and also with no need to get an assassin past 'genetic-locked' anything. Wouldn't Fontaine planning this assassination so early, against expected (future ?) heavy security, mean that things were already in an undeclared war between Ryan and Fontaine ?? It is after all only a few years after the ADAM products first hit the consumer markets. In-game, didn't they previously hint several places (even by its look) that the 'security' stuff was cobbled together for the 'civil war' emergency (alot of it does look kludged BS1). So this DLC Bot stuff all seems way too early. --- --- Find All The Pieces : Things do tend to fall apart, or are easier to take apart than to put back together, so certain useful/valuable items would have a small Picker Puzzle type activity when 'found' somewhere -- challenging the player to 'get all the pieces' (individual bits probably worth something, a COMPLETE whatzit is worth ALOT ...). Possibly a timed puzzle to get something before its gone. --- --- --- Vita-Chambers From a Game Component to a Canon Device ' : We really don't know all the ins-and-outs of how the Vita Chamber operates -- maybe the Corpse Gnomes™ bring your body and stuff it into the machine before you are fully dead ? You are unconscious, so who is to say how long that takes or what is involved ?? The machine could take a while to do its work, depending on the injuries. Those Medi-Packs we otherwise use do seem to work awfully fast, and likely fix up some pretty horrendous damages -- so why can't this machine (and whatever chemicals/whatever it might pump into you) do the same ?? This is a little more reasonable than some magical 'quantum entanglement', with or without 'Teleporting'. "Corpse Gnomes" might also explain what happened to all the 'Little Brothers' ... : The advanced 'revitalization' process might just be a fancy resuscitation system which works as long as you aren't yet (completely) braindead. Massive regeneration (better when the 'ADAM' effect causes Stem Cell conversion rather than being THE Stem Cells). Ryan may have found additional techniques to accelerate/improve the tissue regeneration, or somethings completely different. It is possible that after Sofia Lamb (effectively) murdered Delta, that his corpse was taken back to the Big Daddy Depot (wherever) for forensics of what went wrong by Fontaine Futuristics or Fail Safe Escorts personnel. (Delta was an early testing model, so they were still debugging alot at that point). He may even have been put 'on ice' intact. He also, as well, probably had various extra/extensive brain scans and such being available for him (again being a test model, they likely had to gather data while his Conditioning was in progress - upto and including scans of his brain synapse patterns, as well as the conditioning tapes which had previously been used to overlay mental patterns onto BD minds). With the start of the Civil War, Delta might have been largely forgotten after being stored away. So there might have been rather ALOT for Eleanor to find to handily piece Delta back together - not just DNA, which might be able to recreate his body (Alpha BD suits were likely to be had - DNA can't recreate that). There is no such thing as the patterns/memories in the brain being stored in DNA/RNA (it is possible the mention of saving his DNA was actually to compare/index it, or to act as templates for BD DNA changes), Eleanor would have to search for the records of Delta. The 'quantum entanglement' BS was Ryan's/Sinclair's marketing hype. The Vita-Chambers can revive/resuscitate you, IF you are recently dead, and Eleanor apparently modified that machine in the Adonis Resort to do a bit more. SO in this case it IS the same body ... Now, how close to the original Delta his long-delayed resuscitation might have made him ?? That is questionable. Many of his 'memories' may have been inserted into his rebuilt mind by Eleanor, to assist in convincing him to come save her. To do some of this work, Eleanor would have to slip away from her mother, but she really needed to get out of Rapture to be truly free of her. Delta would be her solution for that. --- --- --- '''Peach Wilkins - "Putting the Screws On" Audio Diary ' : All the peeps who sought to assassinate Ryan (actually only a handful evidently), none of the tough worker types abused by Fontaine seem to have tried to put a bullet in Fontaine's head (or use a shotgun -- even better) as their 'out' (that given the story they all just can't seem go to the authorities - Fontaine would get wrapped up by the Law pretty quick - its kinda hard to hide that whole Smuggling operation.) But then, ruthless people have a way of instilling fear into people (and plots have a way of avoiding reality). Desperate men and all that. But no.... Just like 'Atlas', locked in the department store, starting to order people around who are half crazy Splicers who are hungry and desperate for ADAM : "Who the F#$% are YOU TO BE GIVIN ME ORDERS !!!!" KABOOOOOOM .... (Perverting the Canon - what did the game makers care by then, with 2K shutting down and quality at a 'just get it done' level ?) --- --- --- --- '''Columbia's Pro-slavery/Pro-Confederacy (Southern Type) Reactionism : Much of the South was poor (little industry and with rich people with slaves, and slave labor driving down wages for workers). The South owed the Northern banks 300 million dollars (in THAT time's money !!!) and there is speculation that could have been an important incentive for the rich borrowers to want to secede to get out of paying their due debts. The North's industries were already (booming) building the economy and wealth, and the South was largely stuck in an agrarian economy selling cash crops. Remember that many of the the Founding Fathers had slaves (even if they were philosophically against it, the fact is they DID have slaves) so for the Founders in Columbia to consider slavery an accepted concept would be natural (?).. If you remember, the people from the generally North didn't (many were against slavery, and THEY also were "Founding Fathers" (Oops...) - the forming of the country almost didn't happen over that issue. (If Booker-Comstock was from the midwest, then he likely would have been anti-slavery ... Oops). Infinite BS morphed from the historical social issues around the turn of the 20th century (immigration culture shock, labor unrest, murderous anarchists, technology advances, urbanization, ongoing racism) to now re-fighting the Civil War/Revolutionary War (slavery, religion, economic manipulation, States Rights vs Federal, cultural reactionism ...) The part I want to hear is the explanation for why all the 'have nots' simply haven't left Columbia for the rest of America (back in the USA people simply left such troubles behind, and moved to new areas where opportunities/freedoms existed). Could people really be 'kept' in Columbia against their will WITHOUT becoming a significant problem ? (exposing the normal 'white' inhabitants to a quite simply un-American tyranny/police state, with it being all very hard to deny/ignore ? If they accept such, they would have represented a VERY SMALL part of the American population ... Oops). So much for real 'social relevancy'. - I would think that Columbia originally (when it was 'official' and normal -- built for the 1893 World Exposition), was a 'Show City' full of 'Actors' (people acting out their roles to present how great America was to the 'heathens' (and THE other foreigners) - like they do at every Exposition). It would be a Potemkin Village, and not a real city -- all false-fronts and facades, and would(could) not be self-sufficient in any way. It would be funded/organized by the US government and/or rich people who thought it was a 'good idea' (prestigious - you'd see their names scrawled everywhere as the projects Patrons), and commercial interests/industries would showcase their products and new technological achievements. OK, lets assume Comstock 'Wowed them' to get his floating exhibition added, but that is not a real city. So WHO then paid many times as much later to make it larger/habitable/comfortable/having industries and everything else Urban Life requires ?? (most likely this was done well AFTER its presentation at the Columbian Exposition, and even after it was sent on its World 'tour' - the Government and Taxpayer dollars would NOT be available for that.) - For Comstock's reactionary/extremist racist Columbia, that there would be any large number of (impure/complicating) immigrants/'the wrong sort' present initially is not overly logical or acceptable to them. One would think that was what the majority of those 'white' inhabitants were escaping from in American society (a few servants is one thing, significant population of workers is another completely). So then there was this 'Founding' ( Columbia Flies Free !!! ), and it would not be everyone's cup-of-tea". Suddenly it is not so 'American' any more (at all). Many of the original normal American 'crew' would try to leave (BTW taking with them alot of the know-how needed to operate/repair it all when they left.) The whole City would have to be ringed with a 'Berlin Wall' to keep the Dissatisfied from leaving (and so WHO now funds and supplies a whole city ?? Who pays for it ? ) -- so Columbia is a Wall built with guns facing inward. Very hard to pretend it is still 'America', no ???. ( Oops, and triple Oops ...) So now Columbia is a Police State/Cultist Theocracy with the 'haves' living in their gated/fortified compounds, and the 'have nots' slaving away in poverty and servitude (and kidnapped slavery even) to provide for their 'betters'. Rather hard for anyone intelligent to equate with "America". Huge amounts of supplies (even for only a small town's population) have to transported into the city, giving plenty of opportunity to 'jump ship' to those so inclined -- that is assuming someone is still clandestinely supplying the place (else they turned thieves/pirate/extorters/slavers, and then as obvious outlaws/disgrace/foreign-policy issues would have the USA and the World out to apprehend them/blow them out of the sky). And even then, what air armada moves all the necessaries UP to Columbia ? We are talking BULK EVERYTHING (wherever it magically comes from). - Could the case be : it really is all Mass Mind Control, and the opposing faction just lets people out of the delusion, becoming THEIR pawns to gain power for themselves ??? Booker isn't exactly a prime candidate for sanity, and so much of the game is of delusional/farcical quality. See those 'Vox' StormTroopers on the side opposite the Founders ? They sure do seem awfully well equipped for an army of 'poor people'/the-down-trodden. (Sorry Kenny, you don't just strap on stolen equipment and become trained myrmidons - they probably will though be quite effective in fumbling and stumbling around killing themselves and others on their own side, and being slaughtered by the fully trained professionals.) Regular cullings of any opposition by the tyrant's para-miltaries - thats what happens in a real Police State. There really isn't anywhere to hide. So again, the setting is faulty to the point of Nonsense. --- --- --- --- Original Inhabitants of Columbia : The 'Actors' in this Potemkin Village (Columbia the modern American 'Show City') would be chosen for their particular look and function (to present a carefully tailored tableau to 'The Foreigners' ( and Americans being affirmed) who are to be impressed - possibly including a smattering of a few 'happy' token immigrant types). The Exhibition ends, and the 'Actors' would expect to go home. Families would there would have been undesirable (except for any show-portrayed 'families' - who likely wouldn't be real anyway) as they would just increase the overhead - housing space/facilities/supplies ALL adding to the 'Show City's' Building and Operating Expenses and complicating the whole project. The living facilities then present would likely be all up to date - Modern (for 1893) - certainly the parts that any 'Exhibition Goer' could see (and I don't think Columbia would be serviced by troglodytes, living in the steerage basements - servicing has to go on at all hours, in plain view). Unskilled people would not be desired (with all the latest gadgets, alot of those crude jobs are supposed to be shown eliminated or reduced), and everything else requires lots of skilled workers (who would have the power of their own choices 'On the Surface' and the knowledge/attitude to avoid coercion and thus be able to cause big trouble for anyone denying them their freedom). After the 'change of management' in Columbia (the 'Secession'), many of the 'Show City' pretenses could be discarded (I still don't see how it then supplies itself past that point - the change would cause losing their previously arranged government supply chain). Feeding everyone would be the first priority (and I don't see the thousand of acres of good farmland needed to supply very basic/minimal foodstuffs required for a small town). Likely, with the initial 'Foundings' outflow of people, many jobs might revert to manual labor. They would have to 'restock' a 'lower class' (by kidnapping people, or getting visitors who find themselves stranded, or that ridiculous 'rented' black prison convict thing) who also probably would not like their situation (otherwise where is the Island of the Oompa Loompas to get the needed laborers ??) It is funny that the 'props' originally shown (the immigration form with the various 1900 classifications - ie 'Papist') implied they didn't want any of the 'wrong type' (making it odd there would be so many of them accumulated ... Oopsie). --- --- --- --- 'The Art Deco in (Rapture) Game was Pretty Mediocre/Spotty ' : Maybe reflects additional later post-war period (not everything HAS to be Art Deco), though the City's theme was 20s-30s which were Ryan's formative years (and the 1920s Art Deco was pre socialist-FDR-isms) Rich people (ie- The "Olympus Heights Crowd") could/would have had better Art Deco (ceilings, etc ... even if all their furniture was stolen/burned for heat by BS1 times) - the MMORPG won't be an as limited rendered environment as a game released in 2007 (game graphics are always tailored to some median graphics capabilities of the Player demographics). Asset/render running budget of the MMORPG games may still preclude extravagant detailing, but many real uses of Art Deco employed repeated textures of stenciled patterns, common duplication of decorative prefab sections. Frequently accessed places like the Player's own residence, and business, and 'bank' and probably the City Hall (where more than a little of the Player's time is spent) can be 'enhanced'. Some tricks can be employed to delay full viewing, until the full asset detail can be loaded into memory. The amount of quality Art Deco Assets initially probably will be a problem (eventually solved by Player Creators over time). --- --- --- 'Since Infinite BS Was All About 'Scenes' : ' How much dramatic/awesome would Columbia be being seen in orbit around Saturn ??? With the Lala-land made-up physics and chronic avoidance of reality, THAT would have been fully possible. With 'Tears' and such mechanisms being used, floating around a billion miles away wouldn't be much more different that floating at 25000 feet. ( If a fantasy rocket could take you to 25000 ft Columbia why not all the way to Saturn ? ) The whole rest of the weird nonsensical storyline and slaughter-fest game could have been left EXACTLY the same for all Columbia's location mattered -- Giant Statues AND The Rings OF Saturn !!!! (SOOOO MUCH PRETTIER!!!) Imagine THAT going onto the Denny's napkin used as the game's design document. --- --- --- 'If Ryan Never Died (there be Proofs !!), Then What Happened To Jack ? ' : Jack was a fabricated person with incomplete memories/shaped thinking processes, subjected to weird mind control, and unless you played through 'dry' also a major-league ADAM user. So what we think we saw throughout the game doesn't have to be much the truth (it was all seen via YOUR ADAM-addled brain). So what would Ryan do with Jack after he sent him bird-dogging after Atlas (followed by Ryan's remaining loyal Security men and a flotilla of Elite Flybots), and then the subsequent demise of Atlas/Fontaine ? Bad ending ?? Easy enough that Jack simply dies of something (Childhood disease maybe ??) before he was able to do much - to the Surface or Rapture. BTW, no SLBM submarine (Boomer) would EVER be sent to investigate a plane crash like that (Cold war still on, surface ships are for that, etc... ) So sorry, no nukes for 'Evil' (bad) Jack. Get him outta the Big Daddy suit which he really isn't quite conditioned for ( BTW, I didn't see him get administered the 'Brute' Tonics he would need to operate in that very encumbering BD suit that weighs several hundred pounds.) How to reshape Jack's mind (by Ryan) - actually a chance to remake Jack into an Objectivist posterchild. All of Jack's ADAM changes can't be undone, but could be stabilized and harnessed for Rapture's good. Attempts to fix the negative ADAM side-effects, which would afflict Jack with the amounts he had taken over such a short time. Probably growing back his vocal cords would be good. Various surgery repairs were possible using ADAM, and we only got a subset of all the treatments that existed (like which ones did Steinman use in his work ?) If you can grow a flamethrower arm you could rebuilt a voice box (might not sound exactly the same...). Tenenbaum could have applied something like that to regenerate the needed tissue (and other things) before de-tonicing/de-plasmidizing (or whatever else she did to get Jack closer back to normalcy and to avoid all the genetic turbulence which twisted Splicers who had done only a fraction of the Splicing Jack had done). To match the later BS2 Canon, this largely would be done in secret by Ryan , perhaps with Jack being instrumental in saving 3/4 of the City from Lamb's Insane Murderous Grasp (and you don't ever hear her mention her utter defeats there -- collectivists never like to admit failure, because the unfortunates under their power will "smell blood".) --- --- --- 'Alternate Plot Infinite - With 50% Less BS ' : It might've been better if the game setting was to be a religious schism/faction fight, and no longer a tweaked class struggle issue being the source of friction (and the poorly contrived blast-fest game scenario with the farcical 'rebellion'). Perhaps with Fink's amazing technological advancements (Fantasy make it happen) the work and services done by the lower orders is to be done by new automatons, and Comstock and his cronies just want to drop the ex-serfs/slaves over the side to be rid of them (or some strange cultist human sacrifice might be in order ...). Some significant portion of the population doesn't like that inhuman idea, and the fighting and fun begins. Police states have no problem oppressing people, and ruthlessly eliminating violent opponents. There is substantial firepower in evidence in Columbia -- not what you would find with a police force found in any typical American city/town at that time (But remember - THIS is America !! Sayeth the writers -- All in all, a whole LOT of BS is shoveled out). --- --- 'Mix of Skills in Rapture's Story (Founding of the City) ' : * Adjustments to 'work' types made over time, and not everything could be adequately preplanned ... (some deficiencies were unforeseen/unexpected) * Additional personnel could be recruited to correct the shortcomings (it is Stupid/contrived that Lamb wasn't properly vetted as a socialist/collectivist/insano for someone who might be able to adversely affect so many Citizens - likewise that only 'one' psychologist would somehow be able to handle the problem). * News Technology and Training imported from Surface - things needed for the required self-sufficiency * Ryan would pay/subsidize for Vocational training for the most critical needs, and leave less important to be funded by various industries and businesses (creating some business opportunities serving those needs). Rapture's basic schools and its University would be geared towards future needs. The next generation is NOT born with its knowledge and skills. Rapture's Initial design planning was done using Ryan's Surface Organization - the problem was limiting the true plan's details on a "need to know basis" for secrecy. In the MMORPG there are many skill gaps amongst the Citizens of New Rapture, and the inhabitants are admonished to "Increase their skills to be able to advance and improve their city's future" --- --- --- --- 'Another Collections Bucket (If you Pass "GO", then collect your Eternal Reward !!)... ' : With Levine's strange ideas about Christian Religion (what it really isn't ... ignorance or intent ?????), he missed the chance to have another 'Vending Machine' where you buy prayers and extra bonus's for when you get into heaven. All for a price of course (his religious viewpoint is mercantile enough to be selling 'Indulgences' ...). Some appropriate verbage and sound effects (like the Epstein The Swami machines) would result, as well as a "Reciept". The 'Halleleuyah Machine' ... (Seems a "No Brainer" to have had that .) --- --- 'Chicken-Little-ism Sells Newspapers (Especially When Hints are Heard Everywhere) ' : This is why Rapture WOULD have heard about the bad ADAM side-effects as soon as they started happening. The press couldn't keep away from it (competing for stories, and some of them having reputations for largely telling the truth, while other's sensationalism would put the Citizenry on their guard). And if Fontaine started/attempted threatening/intimidating them in any serious ways, at least the ones Ryan had an interest in would hear about it and would have HIS backing to counter those threats -- especially once Fontaine was getting more and more on Ryan's shit-list (definitely once Sullivan's investigation found Fontaine being behind the City's major Smuggling). Having ADAM products physically and mentally maim Citizens would be something Ryan would support having exposed (One agent of his "Let the Buyer Beware" philosophy was a Free Press to let the consumer be aware). SO the original game's plot is merely a fabrication to allow Fontaines/Atlas getting where they are, while ignoring plausible realism. A task for the MMORPG is to rewrite/append-to those vague spotty accounts (which the ADAM-addled Player encountered) and fill in a more plausible history (The Chronic Vagueness, despite making for the original lazy storytelling, can offer the solution for telling the tale properly). --- --- --- --- . . . . . .